In the News

I am on Spring Break this week. A time of relaxation. A time of renewing. A time to do things I just don’t have time to do when I’m teaching. I have found myself reading a few news stories on foxnews.com. There’s no particular reason why I am reading them on that web site. It’s on my google page, so I guess I just find it easy to see what’s going on in the world.

I’m the first to admit that I don’t know much about worldly or national affairs. It might be an occupational hazard, but when you’re dealing with 7 & 8 year olds all day, knowing more about the Jonas brothers or the Wii is much more practical than speculating about the stock market or Obama’s latest snafu.

I happened to click on a story that captured my attention. (The topic of this story isn’t relevant to what I’m about to say, but for you inquiring minds, it had to do with people calling for Geithner’s resignation.) Anyway – as I finished reading the article, I scanned the “top stories” to see if I needed to be educated on anything else. What I saw appalled me. Of the 16 stories listed as “Today’s Top Stories,” only 2 were positive. The rest were depressing, disgusting or just down-right dumb.

It made me stop and think about the world in which we live. I don’t know about you, but on a daily basis, I am not surrounded by child killers, mothers who bite school personnel, drug-abusing pilots, or accountants committing fraud. I’m not saying this stuff doesn’t happen in our world. Obviously and shamefully, it does. What I am saying is could someone please just write something worth reading? Something that would inspire the average American to do good, to help others, to spread kindness? Would that be too hard to do?

I’m proud to have people in my world who make scrapbooks for friends who cannot, who make brownies just to cheer up a colleague, who rebuild computers for someone who doesn’t have those resources, who work with kids who need a positive adult figure in their lives, and so much more. Where are the news stories reporting this?

Stories highlighting love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control are the types of stories I want to read.